non-existent customer support

My wife and I, after careful research in March of this year (read: 9 months ago), bought a Sony digital camera. $350. A little over the price of the nearest competitor, but after 40 years of buying Sony products I figured if anything went wrong they would be there for me. Not only were they not "there" for me, but their product had an issue from the beginning: had corrosion. We tried a few different new Sony batteries, even battery chargers. Finally, the damn thing just stopped working. Sony refused to repair it under warranty, told us it would cost $160 to repair. I reiterated to them it was bad from the start, and their response was we should have let them know before...! NEVER EVER PURCHASE ANY SONY PRODUCT UNLESS YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT THE WARRANTY. Their "customer service", and moreover their concept of loyalty (I HAD been a Sony die-hard since 1970!!) is atrocious.